Disney fans dismayed with 'Disco Yeti'

Deep inside the 20-story Expedition Everest attraction at Disney's Animal Kingdom stands one of the most sophisticated animatronics Disney has ever built: a nearly 25-foot-tall, 20,000-pound abominable snowman powered by hydraulic cylinders with more potential thrust than a 747 jetliner.

And it has stopped working.

Where the Disney yeti once snarled and lunged at passing roller-coaster trains, riders in recent years have found it motionless and dark, lit only by strobe lights designed to create an illusion of movement.

Much the way scientists have debated alleged sightings of a real yeti in the wild, Disney followers now debate sightings of a moving yeti inside Everest. There is an entry on the online encyclopedia Wikipedia devoted to the subject, which claims the "last known full A-mode operation" of the Disney yeti occurred in March 2009.

It is the type of detail that likely goes unnoticed by the vast majority of the 26,000 people who visit Disney's Animal Kingdom each day. But among Disney's most passionate followers, it is a source of uncommon consternation.

'Disney Difference'

The $100 million Expedition Everest, after all, has been the marquee attraction at Disney's Animal Kingdom since opening in early 2006 -- and the yeti is supposed to be the attraction's biggest star.

"There is such a thing as the 'Disney Difference,'. " said Tony Crane, a 35-year-old telecommunications-company owner and Disney fan from St. Louis, echoing a phrase often used by Walt Disney Co. executives. "And to a lot of people who really try to defend that Disney Difference, it's embarrassing that this technological marvel is left ÃÂ to just sit there. It's very Six Flags-y."

Disney acknowledges its yeti is no longer working as originally designed. But it would not provide a timetable for repairs.

"The yeti is a complicated Audio-Animatronics figure whose complex functions have presented some challenges affecting its operation," said Walt Disney World spokeswoman Andrea Finger. "We purposely took measures in 2008 to reduce unnecessary stress and preserve many of its functions while we studied possible long-term solutions.

"At this point," she added, "we're still considering those options."

Complex machinery

The Disney yeti is an intricate bit of hardware. It has 19 axes of motion and moving parts, from its pelvis to its neck to its fingers. Constructed to appear as if it were hanging over the roller-coaster track, the yeti's free arm can move five feet horizontally and a foot-and-a-half vertically.

It is about as lifelike as a robotic creature of myth can be. Disney "Imagineers," the creative engineers who develop Disney attractions, studied primate skeletons to ensure their yeti had believable proportions, designing the beast's head, for instance, with the skull of a langur monkey and the arrowlike crest of a gorilla.

Though it appears only for a few seconds near the end of Expedition Everest, the entire ride is spent building to that climactic encounter. Everest's queue winds through a yeti museum, featuring statues and masks depicting the beast, grainy black-and-white photographs, even a shredded tent and damaged camping equipment from a mysterious "lost expedition.

The roller-coaster trains climb past giant footprints pressed into the faux mountainside snow. A silhouette of the creature appears to tear up a portion of the track and send riders hurtling in a new direction.

"The yeti not working to me is akin to riding the Haunted Mansion and not having any ghosts in the graveyard or riding Tower of Terror and having to get off just before the drop," said Martin Smith, a 38-year-old sound engineer from Manchester, England, who said he visits Disney World once a year.

Stress management

Disney would not discuss issues with the yeti beyond referencing the "stress" caused by the figure's movement. The most popular theory among company followers: The yeti's swiping-arm motion was so powerful that it has weakened the base of the animatronic, forcing Disney to shut it down to prevent further damage. (The yeti is one of three separate structures that make up Expedition Everest, along with the roller-coaster track and the mountain shell; none of the three structures touches.)

Perhaps the greater mystery is why it has not yet been repaired. Disney did at one point try paring down the yeti's movements, but even limited motion has long since been abandoned in favor of the stationary, strobe-lit version that some critics derisively refer to as "Disco Yeti."

While Disney insists it is still weighing potential solutions, others suspect the resort hasn't fixed the yeti because executives have decided repairs would be too expensive or require closing the crowd-absorbing ride for too long. Expedition Everest can carry about 2,000 people an hour.